1. Field of the Invention
The invention relates generally to a vehicle seat apparatus, and, more specifically to a vehicle seat apparatus that allows a vehicle seat to swivel with respect to a vehicle floor.
2. Description of the Related Art
Vehicle seat apparatuses of this type are described in Japanese Patent Application Publication No. 7-215113 (JP-A-7-215113) and Japanese Patent Application Publication No. 2002-337619 (JP-A-2002-337619). With an automobile seat apparatus described in JP-A-7-215113, an automobile seat in the second row is allowed to swivel around to face an automobile seat in the third row in a passenger compartment.
European Patent Application Publication No. 1693245 describes a seat apparatus with which seats in the second row are allowed to swivel inward in a passenger compartment to face each other. Japanese Patent Application Publication No. 2000-40148 (JP-A-2000-40148) describes a technology for determining the arousal level --of a driver based on an image of the driver.
However, in an example described in JP-A-7-215113, in order to swivel the automobile seat in the second row around to face the automobile seat in the third row, a cumbersome operation, for example, manually swiveling the automobile seat in the second row, is required. Therefore, there is still room for improvement in enhancing the usability of an automobile seat to further increase the comfort of a passenger compartment.